The eight moon phases
The eight moon phases divide one 29.5-day lunation into equal 45-degree slices, from the invisible New Moon through to the last sliver of Waning Crescent. Your birth moon phase is whichever slice the Moon occupied on the day you were born. Each page below covers one phase in full; this page is the directory.
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Waxing Crescent
4-31% lit, growing · Crescent type
Pushes against whatever is holding the idea back.
waxing crescent moon meaning
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First Quarter
31-69% lit, growing · First Quarter type
Forces the decision everyone else is avoiding.
first quarter moon meaning
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Waxing Gibbous
69-96% lit, growing · Gibbous type
Refines the thing until it actually works.
waxing gibbous moon meaning
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Full Moon
96-100% lit · Full Moon type
Sees the whole picture, including the parts you hid.
full moon personality
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Waning Gibbous
96-69% lit, shrinking · Disseminating type
Explains what they learned, whether or not you asked.
waning gibbous moon meaning
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Last Quarter
69-31% lit, shrinking · Last Quarter type
Quietly rebuilds their beliefs and tells you afterwards.
last quarter moon meaning
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Waning Crescent
31-4% lit, shrinking · Balsamic type
Lets things end so the next thing can start.
waning crescent moon meaning
Where to go next
To compare two phases rather than read one, the compatibility chart covers all 36 combinations. To get the phases for two specific birth dates, use the moon phase soulmate calculator. To find only your own, the birthday lookup takes a single date. Longer reads on phases and pairings sit in the guides directory, and the site background explains how the readings are sourced.
How the eight phases divide up
The 8 phases split into two halves of 4, and the half a birth date falls in says more about the reading than the individual phase does. The waxing half runs from New Moon through Waxing Gibbous, covering 0 to 180 degrees of elongation, while light is increasing. The waning half runs from Full Moon through Waning Crescent, covering 180 to 360 degrees, while light is decreasing.
Waxing phases are read as building phases. The 4 readings in that half describe people who commit while a situation is still forming, and who are strongest when an outcome is still open. Waning phases are read as integrating phases. Those 4 readings describe people who come into their own once there is something finished to interpret, teach, refine or close.
4 of the 8 phases mark exact moments rather than spans. New Moon sits at 0 degrees, First Quarter at 90, Full Moon at 180 and Last Quarter at 270. The other 4, the crescents and gibbous phases, fill the 45-degree gaps between those points, which is why their illumination bands are wide and the quarter bands are not.
Why illumination and phase name disagree
Each named phase owns a 45-degree slice of the wheel centred on its exact moment, not a slice of the illumination percentage. Because illumination follows a cosine rather than a straight line, equal angular slices produce unequal percentage bands. First Quarter spans 31% to 69% lit, while New Moon spans only 0% to 4%.
That is why a birth date showing 36% illumination is a First Quarter and not a crescent. The percentage on each page below is the real figure for that band, and the astronomy guide works through the formula that produces it.
Which page to open
Open a single phase page to read one person, including the illumination data, a situational example and 2 questions specific to that phase. Open the pairing chart to compare two phases against each other across all 36 combinations. If you do not know the phase yet, either calculator returns it from a birth date in one step.